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Winner (band)
Winner (Hangul: 위너, RR: Wineo), stylized as WINNER, 'is a South Korean boy group formed in 2013 by YG Entertainment through reality survival program ''WIN: Who Is Next. The group currently consists of four members, one of the original members, Taehyun, departed from the group in November 2016. History '''2010–2013: Pre-debut In 2010, the group's leader Kang Seung-yoon was a contestant on Mnet's Superstar K2, finishing in fourth place. The following year, he signed with YGE and made his acting debut in the sitcom High Kick: Revenge of the Short Legged. In 2013, he debuted as a solo artist and released multiple tracks, including the hit single "It Rains". In 2010, Kim Jin-woo was brought to the agency by Big Bang's Seungri through Joy Dance Plug In Music Academy, thus successfully joining as a trainee. Nam Tae-hyun was recruited by the agency through an audition in 2011. Lee Seung-hoon competed in SBS's K-pop Star 1 in 2012, finishing in fourth place. Soon after it was revealed, Seung-hoon signed under YGE on May 16. Song Min-ho initially debuted under Y2Y Contents Company in the group BoM, which disbanded two years later. In 2013, he joined YGE through audition, after being spotted from his acting appearance in the Channel A's The Strongest K-POP Survival. 2013–2014: WIN: Who Is Next and debut In August 2013, the five trainees competed as "Team A" on Mnet survival program WIN: Who Is Next. During the finale episode on October 25, 2013, it was announced that they had won the competition and would be debuting as "Winner", and would perform as the opening act for Big Bang's Japanese dome tour beginning on November 15. From December 13, Winner appeared in their own reality program, Winner TV, which had ten episodes aired on Mnet. Teasers for the show's episodes were also uploaded on the group's YouTube channel. On March 1 and 2, 2014 Winner appeared as guests in 2NE1 All or Nothing tour in Seoul Bangidong’s Olympic Park SK Olympic Handball Arena. On March 17, YGE reported Winner will also be appearing as guests in other stops of 2NE1's second world tour. Winner performed in Hong Kong on March 22, April 11 in China, April 26 and 27 in Taiwan, May 17 in the Philippines and May 24 in Malaysia. Between June and August 2014, the group members were re-introduced to the public in anticipation for their debut, through a series of teaser images and videos. Ahead of debut, Winner's debut showcase was held on August 6, with their album 2014 S/S digitally released on August 12 and physically on August 14. After several delays, the group made their Korean debut at the YG Family Concert on August 15, 2014. Their first music show appearance was on Inkigayo on August 17, and soon became the fastest group to win on a music show by taking first place on M! Countdown. The album charted at number one on Billboard World Albums Chart while their lead single "Empty" achieved an "all-kill" in South Korea, becoming the group's first number one hit on the Gaon Chart. On September 10, the group released the Japanese version of their debut album, 2014 S/S: Japan Collection which peaked at No.2 on the Oricon Weekly Album Chart. They embarked on their first Japan tour on September 11, later successfully concluding the tour in Tokyo on October 11, drawing 50,000 fans in total. On December 9, 2014, Fuse announced their 13 Top Breakout Artists of 2014, with Winner coming in at #11, being the only South Korean artists on the list. On December 17 Dazed Digital published their top 20 K-pop tracks of 2014 with Winner at #10 with "Color Ring". 2015–2016: Solo activities, EXIT : E, and Taehyun's departure In 2015, the group went on hiatus while the members pursued solo endeavors. Taehyun appeared in several acting roles, including in MBC's web drama Midnight's Girl, SBS's Late Night Restaurant, and the joint Chinese-Korean production Under the Black Moonlight. Seungyoon also returned to acting with the successful CJ E&M web drama We Broke Up, which garnered over 16 million views. Jinwoo appeared in the Chinese-Korean drama Magic Cellphone, while Mino competed on the fourth season of Mnet's rap contest Show Me the Money and finished as runner-up. A number of his digital releases from the program were commercially successful, including "Fear" featuring Taeyang, which became the show's most downloaded single with over one million digital sales. In September, the group embarked on their second Japan tour which wrapped up in October with over 36,000 attendees. In December, it was announced that the group would be returning from hiatus in 2016, with a comeback spread over five 'project releases'. The group's first release in 2016 was a "warm-up" duet featuring Mino and Taehyun, titled "Pricked". Although the single was not promoted, it charted at #2 on MelOn and #1 on iTunes in nine countries. In the lead-up to the group's official comeback, a number of musical covers of their title tracks, "Baby Baby" and "Sentimental", were released daily from 20 to 28 of January as promotional teasers, featuring 8 artists, which they are: Lee Hi, Taeyang, Zion.T, DEAN, AKMU, Katie Kim, G-Dragon, and Epik High. The mini-album EXIT : E was released on February 1, and served as Winner's return after a long break since their debut. EXIT : E debuted at No. 2 on Billboard's World Albums Chart and at No. 3 on the Heatseekers Album chart. Lead singles "Baby Baby" and "Sentimental" topped eight music charts in Korea and received a real-time all-kill. Winner held their first concert, "WINNER Exit Tour in Seoul" on March 12 and 13 at Olympic Gymnasiums Arena in Seoul with additional stops in Gwangju, Daegu, and Busan in April. In April, Winner appeared on the JTBC variety show Half-Moon Friends. The show was popular in China, garnering 75 million views via the Chinese platform Miaopai. They were also named as celebrity ambassadors for 2016 Korea Brand & Entertainment EXPO by KOTRA. In June, the group then commenced on their third Japanese tour which drew 36,000 fans in total. In June, Mino was confirmed to be teaming up with iKON member Bobby to release a unit album. Their unit group was called MOBB and released their debut extended play The MOBB ''on September 8. The EP's 2 collaborative singles, "Hit me" and "Full House", were released the following day. On August 31, it was revealed that Seunghoon will be joining tvN’s new cooking and travel show “Eat Sleep Eat". The show was filmed in Krabi, Thailand and aired starting November 30. On October 12, YG Entertainment announced that Taehyun would be taking a hiatus from the group and that the rest of the ''Exit Movement series would be delayed indefinitely. On November 25, Taehyun's departure from the group was announced. It was decided that Winner would continue as a four-member group, without any addition of new members. In November, Jinwoo was announced as the lead in the production of The Little Prince by the Korea National Contemporary Dance Company. He is the first K-pop idol to be part of contemporary dance production. Also, it was announced that Seungyoon and Jinwoo will be starring in the web drama Love for a Thousand More. The web drama is a joint production of CJ E&M, YG Entertainment, and YGKPlus. In the same month, Seungyoon was confirmed to be joining SBS Flower Crew after the withdrawal of Sechs Kies members Eun Jiwon and Lee Jai-jin from the show. Mino also joined the cast of New Journey to the West in filming for the third season of the show. Filming started in November in China and the show aired starting on 8 January and ended on 12 March 2017. In December, Mino also participated on Infinite Challenge history hip hop project called ‘Great Inheritance’. He performed the song 'Shoot' about the famous general Lee Soon Shin with Infinite Challenge member Haha. 2017: Fate Number For and ''Our Twenty For'' Throughout January the members started hinting at an upcoming comeback, later it was confirmed by their agency YG Entertainment that the group would be releasing new music on April 4, with the single album Fate Number For. In late-March, several promotional teasers were released, ultimately unveiling the double title tracks, "Really Really" and "Fool". "Really Really" debuted at No. 3 on Billboard World Digital Song Sales, marking the group's best position to date; while "Fool" debuted at No. 4. "Really Really" was also chosen as one of the songs on Apple Music's "Best of the Week" list. As part of their promotions, Winner held a three-day "concept showroom" showcase, from April 2 to 4, at Club NB in Seoul's Mapo District, owned by YG founder/CEO Yang Hyun-suk. In May, Winner released their debut Japanese single, which contains Japanese renditions of "Really Really" and "Fool". Also in May, Mino left with the cast of New Journey to the West to film the show's fourth season in Vietnam. The filming took place from May 8 to May 15 and aired from June 13. On May 10, Seungyoon recorded as special MC for MBC Radio Star. He was filling in for Super Junior’s Kyuhyun, who was filming for New Journey to the West 4. On June, it was confirmed that Jinwoo will be a part of MBC’s variety program Wizard of Nowhere. He took part on the filming in Georgia for about 1 week and the show started airing on July 30. On July 25, it was confirmed that Seungyoon was officially cast in Prison Playbook, TvN drama written by the creator of the “Reply” series, Shin Won Ho. The drama held its first script reading on July 17. Seungyoon took the role of Lee Joo-hyung aka "Jang Bal-jang". The drama aired from November 22, 2017 to January 18, 2018. On August 4, Winner made a comeback with the single album Our Twenty For. Two singles, "Love Me Love Me" and "Island" were released. "Love Me Love Me" was chosen by Dazed Digital as one of the 20 best K-Pop songs of 2017. On August 30, Mino recorded as Special MC for MBC Radio Star, filling in for Super Junior’s Kyuhyun. On October 11, a source from tvN confirmed that Winner has started filming for their version of Youth Over Flowers. The show is a special supplementary show to “New Journey to the West 4”, which ended back in August, granting the wish of Mino to appear on “Youth Over Flowers” with his fellow Winner members. The filming took place in West Australia and airing started on November 7. On November, Mino also joins the filming for Kang's Kitchen, another supplementary show to 'New Journey to the West 4" and a parody to Youn's Kitchen. The show was filmed in Jeju Island and aired starting December 5. On November 30, Seungyoon and Mino released "The Door,” OST for tvN’s drama, Prison Playbook. The lyrics were written by Zico and Song Mino and were composed and arranged by Zico and Pop Time. As of December 2017, "Really Really" surpassed the 100 million views mark, making Winner the first ever male idol group in history to surpass 100 million streams, while keeping their 'Chart-In' status. 2018: Japan tour, EVERYD4Y, WWIC2018, EVERYWHERE: World Tour and "Millions" In February 2018, Winner released their second Japanese single, ''Our Twenty For'', which contained two new original Japanese songs, "Raining" and "Have a Good Day". They also embarked on their fourth Japan Concert Tour. On April 4, the group's second studio album EVERYD4Y was released along with the title track "Everyday". The album contains 12 tracks including a Korean version of "Raining" and "Have a Good Day". The title track 'Everyday' placed no. 1 on all 8 Korean music charts and the new album was ranked at no. 1 on iTunes Charts in 18 different countries. On June 11, Seunghoon was confirmed in the final line-up of dance coaches on KBS2’s teen dance battle program “Dancing High”. He became the coach of the dance team "Big Dipper". The show aired its first episode on September 7. On June 17, Winner successfully held their private stage, WWIC 2018, 3 years since their last event back in 2015. It was held two times at Olympic Hall, Seoul at 1 PM and 6 PM (KST). A total of 6,000 tickets were sold. On July 4, Winner announced their first concert tour, EVERYWHERE. The tour kicked off in Seoul, South Korea at the Olympics Gymnastics Arena on August 19 at 6 pm (KST) and made stops in 7 Asian countries such as Taipei, Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok, Singapore, Manila, Jakarta, and Hong Kong. Since the announcement, there have been releases of teasers to promote their world tour. On July 26, "Where R U From", the sub-title track from Big Bang Seungri's solo album ''The Great Seungri'' was released, which Mino featured and co-written. The music video for the song was later released on July 27. On August 4, Mino was spotted with the cast of New Journey to the West for the filming of its new season. The filming took place in Hongkong and Hokkaido, Japan. The fifth and sixth season started airing on September 30 and ended on December 2. On November 14, it was announced by YG Entertainment that Winner will bring their Everywhere tour in North America in Early 2019. Winner will make six stops in the United States starting with Seattle on January 15 and one stop in Toronto, Canada on Jan. 27. Other stops in the United States include San Francisco, Los Angeles, Dallas, Chicago, New York. On November 26, Mino released his first solo album "XX" with lead single Fiancé. The song dominated the Korean music scenes by topping several domestic charts as well as topping iTunes Album Charts in 16 various countries. In the same month, YG Entertainment confirmed Winner will hold an encore concert in KSPO DOME (Olympic Gymnastics Arena) located in Songpa-gu, Seoul on January 5. In December 2018, it was confirmed that Winner will make a comeback approximately 8 months since EVERYD4Y was released. Winner’s upcoming new song will be a pre-release single from Winner's 3rd official album. It was later revealed that Winner's new single is titled "Millions" and was written by Seungyoon, Mino, and Seunghoon, while the song was composed by Seungyoon, Kang Ukjin, and Diggy. The digital single, "Millions" and its music video was officially released on December 19 at 6 PM while physical copies were released on December 24. "Millions" topped the music chart of 7 major Korean music platforms and of iTunes Song Charts in 19 different regions. Winner performed their comeback stage for "Millions" on December 22 in Show! Music Core. 2019: ''We'' Members Current *Jinu *Hoony *Mino *Yoon Former *Taehyun Discography Korean Studio Albums *''2014 S/S'' (2014) *''EVERYD4Y'' (2018) Live Albums *''2016 Winner Exit Tour In Seoul Live CD'' (2016) Single Albums *''Fate Number For'' (2017) *''Our Twenty For'' (2017) *''Millions'' (2018) Extended Plays *''EXIT : E (2016) *We'' (2019) Singles Pre-debut (as Team A) * "Just Another Boy" * "Go Up" Post-debut * "Empty" (공허해) * "Color Ring" (컬러링) * "Pricked" (Mino & Taehyun) * "Sentimental" (센치해) * "Baby Baby" * "Really Really" * "Fool" * "Love Me Love Me" * "Island" * "Everyday" * "Millions" * "Ah Yeah" (아예) Japanese Studio Albums * 2014 S/S: Japan Collection (2014) * Our Twenty For (2018) Filmography Endorsements